For 2017-18, the government aims to further bring down the fiscal deficit -- the gap between expenditure and revenue -- to 3.2 per cent.

The government today said it has achieved the fiscal deficit target of 3.5 per cent of GDP in 2016-17. (Reuters)

The government today said it has achieved the fiscal deficit target of 3.5 per cent of GDP in 2016-17. “Fiscal deficit is 3.51 per cent of GDP or Rs 5.35 lakh crore in 2016-17,” the Controller General of Accounts (CGA) said while releasing the provisional accounts for the last financial year. For 2017-18, the government aims to further bring down the fiscal deficit — the gap between expenditure and revenue — to 3.2 per cent. The CGA further said that revenue deficit during the last fiscal was 2.02 per cent of GDP. As per the provisional data, the fiscal deficit in April 2017 was Rs 2.05 lakh crore, which is 37.6 per cent of the Budget estimate, as against 25.7 per cent in the year-ago period.

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Total expenditure of the government in April was Rs 2.42 lakh crore, or 11.3 per cent of the full-year estimate. Revenue collection was Rs 35,081 crore, or 2.3 per cent, of the estimate. Total receipts of the government — from revenue and non-debt capital — in April stood at Rs 36,529 crore. The revenue deficit during the month was Rs 1,78,383 crore, or 55.4 per cent, it said. Revenue deficit refers to the shortfall in total government revenue realisation from the targeted figure.